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01101101 writes "The Duluth News Tribune is reporting that Wisconsin could be the first state to ban mandatory microchip implants in humans. The plan was authored by Rep. Marlin Schneider, D-Wisconsin Rapids and Gov. Jim Doyle plans to sign the bill. The bill still leaves an opening for voluntary chipping." Slashdot covered one instance of mandatory microchip implants back in February.

A legal ban on mandatory microchip implantation is pointless in a way, as the real threat is that they will become so pervasive that it will be impossible to lead a normal life (e.g. buy groceries, vote, hold a drivers license) without one.

The problem with this is that desparate people will "volunteer" if employers, etc. EXPECT them to volunteer. Just like waiters, waitresses "volunteered" for being exposed to second hand smoking, before smoking was banned completely. Voluntary chipping will hurt the most volnurable segments of the society, who can't even afford not to" volunteer", while the more powerful can stay free.

What is the difference between having a chip implanted and having some system that can recognize you by DNA, heat signature, or whatever? Those systems are coming and they're exactly the same thing except without the invasive chip injection procedure. This chip thing is just a temporary measure until the other technology advances.

There won't be much you can do about it. Businesses love this for security because there is no passcode for someone to steal and employees don't need to remember passcodes. Credit card companies would really love it to help prevent fraud (in theory saving us all money, but we know how that goes). This has all sorts of uses, good and bad. It's coming though...

RFID chip implants don't have to be mandatory. All you have to do is make it a rule that you can't fly, or cross the border, or get a drivers license without one.

Are you implying that Americans will just sit back and let that happen in the first place? I don't know a single person that would stand for the government pulling that one over on us.

Now I do think it's plausible that businesses will start requiring RFID chips to be implanted. The added security precaution will seem very enticing to corporate types. Just start imagining only chipped IT employees being allowed in server rooms, or only "Top Secret" chipped people being allowed into Sandia National Labratories, and you'll start to see the benefits.

The government may toy with the idea, but in the end it will be businesses leading this crusade. Kudos to my home state for being proactive about this.

This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding.

Congress can still pull "mandatory chip implants is interstate commerce!" and overrule the Wisconsin law.

Ahhh, but that is meaningless...
Wisconsin had to change their licenses because it would not meet federal regulations as a valid ID for a number of services.
So it may not be expired, but when the law says you cant even use it to buy a lottery ticket or a pack of smokes, it is pretty useless.

Oh, if you want to fly you have to. But it's all voluntary, you don't have to fly.Oh, if you want a job at XXX, you have to. But it's all voluntary, you don't have to work at XXX.Oh, if you want to vote, you have to. But it's all voluntary, you don't have to vote.Oh, if you want to buy food, you have to. But it's all voluntary, you don't have to eat.

"RFID chip implants don't have to be mandatory. All you have to do is make it a rule that you can't fly, or cross the border, or get a drivers license without one."

"Are you implying that Americans will just sit back and let that happen in the first place? I don't know a single person that would stand for the government pulling that one over on us."

Substitute:

The government will set up 'Free Speech Zones' where protesters must stand, set apart from regular crowds

People will be held without a trial for indefinite periods of time, without access to counsel and without even public mention made of the fact that they have been imprisoned

The government will perform wiretaps and searches without specific cause, and without receiving a court order, or with the permission of 'secret courts', the membership and findings of which must remain sealed

I'm sure all of us would have said...

Are you implying that Americans will just sit back and let that happen in the first place? I don't know a single person that would stand for the government pulling that one over on us.

Something like this, it's easy enough to say, "well, you could get another job", but the question is, what if this becomes the new dumb security fad, and 90% of the companies offering decent jobs suddenly require this.

Which actually reminds of the idiotic smoking bans in wisconsin currently happening...
They are trying to ban it based on worker health reasons...of course those people are now out of jobs due to the massive loss in business bars have been experiencing.
They no longer have to worry about second hand smoke, they dont have a job.
Those bans may be repealed in certain areas. and there has been talk of a ban in Milwaukee, but the brewery industry will never allow that one to happen thankfully.
Restraunts and such I can understand, bars should not be held to those restrictions since you go to a bar to drink poison.
Or how about Cigar bars being basically shut down, you cant smoke a cigar in a cigar bar?

Again, alarmist or not, I must echo the sentiments of other posters in stating that when it becomes pervasive, when you cannot buy groceries without an RFID chip, then it's not really about choice, now, is it?
I do believe in freedom of choice, and if you want to implant yourself, go right ahead. But I am simply sick and tired of this Objectivist/Libertarian-esque rhetoric that would have us believe that the best society is the society that, while maintaining an illusion of free will, at least for those on the very top, the "John Galts" of the world, those on the bottom, or those merely satisified enough with their lives that they live simply in a middle class existence, would be the ones most affected by rfid chips, and most of us can't simply choose to find another job at the drop of a hat.

RFID chip implants don't have to be mandatory. All you have to do is make it a rule that you can't fly, or cross the border, or get a drivers license without one.

Are you implying that Americans will just sit back and let that happen in the first place? I don't know a single person that would stand for the government pulling that one over on us.

Try flying, driving, or crossing the border without ID. Try opening a bank account without presenting your government ID number (aka SSN). Try getting insurance, a credit card, a home loan, a car loan, a place to rent, and utilities for that place without presenting a SSN.

Do you realize that we have a backdoor national ID card system right now? Legislation was passed to require an interlinking of driver's license record systems. Driver's licenses have to have biometric data encoded on them. A Supreme Court decision in the past few years means that you can't refuse to present them to law enforcement. Originally, this was portrayed as being intended to keep drunk drivers (especially commercial truck drivers) from just moving to another state to get a new license, but today it's being used by remote jurisdictions to enforce parking and speeding tickets with no means of appeal if the system has you wrong.

We set up an unaccountable national database of people who are not allowed to fly that is based purely on names and aliases instead of more reliable data. Senators have been kept from flying because of the list.

Police today can enter your home, plant listening devices, keystroke monitors, etc. and leave without letting you know and forbidding landlords from telling you about it. They can tap your phones if it's suspected that someone they might be interested in might use the phone (under their discretion). They can snatch records of what you read from the library, who you email and what sites you visit from your ISP, what potentially embarassing medical conditions you might have from your doctor, and any and all business transactions you make from your bank and credit card companies, and none of them can tell you under threat of criminal prosecution.

Our government imprisoned people without trial and without access to laywers in violation of the 6th Amendment. Our government spies on citizens without a warrant in violation of the 4th Amendment. It tortures prisoners in violation of the Geneva Convention as well as the 5th, 6th, and 8th Amendments, and there is a significant portion of the populace that approves of these actions since it makes them feel safer. It even prevents protesters from gathering outside of "Free Speech Zones" in front of the President in violation of the 1st Amendment, and people still aren't outraged.

Let me tell you what Americans will do. NOT A DAMNED THING. All this government has to do is explain how it will protect us against terrorists, child molesters, Iranians, or whoever the hell we're supposed to be most scared of today, and so-called citizens will line up to be sheared like the good little sheep they are.

If you think there is such a thing as public outrage at the loss of our rights, then you haven't been paying attention to in this post-9/11 world. Do you know what gets people angry? High gas prices, incompetent handling of a disaster, and the stink of failure in war.
Civil rights doesn't even register as an issue thanks to the learned helplessness of the American people. Just shelter us from harm, and you can do anything with that guy's rights.

Oh, c'mon. The "People being held without trial for indefinate periods of time" were captured in a WAR ZONE fighting against our troops.

Jose Padilla was captured in the US. Several of the people held in Gitmo are Iraqi citizens who were picked up for wearing casio watches - because the insurgents were using casio watches as timers for IEDs. If wearing a particular brand of watch can get you locked up without a trial for years, we're not living in the America I grew up in.

The list of people held that have nothing to do with the fighting is absurdly large. There is a comedy writer that was held because of a parody cartoon he wrote. Many people are held simply based on rumors and anonymous tips. Two people that are members of an obscure chinese religion are being held even though they have been found perfectly safe because the government claims they have no where to release them to, when there is a large population of that religious sect in Florida.

And both the wars in which they could have been captured (Afghansitan and Iraq) have been declared as over for years - PoWs are supposed to be released as soon as practical after a war is over. As you said, they're there to keep them from jumping back into the fighting, not to punish them for having been fighting.
They seem to fit the definition of a PoW to me, and the fact that the organisations for which they were fighting are not signatories to the Geneva conventions is not a reason to not treat them in accordance with them - The US (the people holding them) ARE signatories and so are bound to treat them in accordance with the conventions (they specifically say this).
If they are being held and they aren't PoW then they MUST be held as common criminals and charged swiftly and tried UNDER THE LAWS OF THE PLACE WHERE THEIR ALLEGED CRIMES TOOK PLACE - there is no other (legal) classification of prisoner.

This remark is disengenous, as it implies somehow there is some "usually" to the government having implanted people before. "Implanting" is very invasive, forcible implanting would feel to many people like rape, and the very subject invokes a deep visceral negative reaction that, IMO, not only would lead to strong political counter reaction, but possibly VIOLENCE.

Yeah, it's pretty obvious you're no expert. How in the hell can you consider this a biased question:"If President Bush wiretapped American citizens without the approval of a judge, do you agree or disagree that Congress should consider holding him accountable through impeachment."

There is little question doubt that the Bush administration performed illegal wiretaps, but the question still left open the possibility of no illegal activity. If you think the question is biased "to the left" you are, apparently, too far to the right to understand what a lack of bias looks like, and if you think it's biased "to the right," the end result would have been well below %50.

Maybe it IS right-weighted and the actual result should have been closer to 75%... I can hope.

a majority of americans support impeachment for illegal domestic wiretapping.

Yeah, but I bet I could ask an equally biased question (like "Should the NSA have the power to monitor whatever communications it needs to in order to prevent a repeat of 9/11?") and probably get an equally overwhelming response.

Heck, if you phrase the questions right you can get people to give completely contradictory statements in the same breath. I've heard polls that basically elicit responses that make people seem like they're both supporting and opposing abortion at the same time. It's not hard to do.

People are stupid. If you know the right question to ask, you can get them to nod and smile and support anything in a poll.